Coal Blocks Auction to Start by June

For the first time, the government will auction coal blocks by June-end and seven explored mines will be up for grabs for companies other than power firms. 

“We had a paper given to us by CII which has worked on the issues and we will be having a presentation by CII very shortly on it”, Coal Secretary, S K Srivastava

Recently, a parliamentary panel had criticised the government for undue delays in allotment of coal mines through auction route amid dry-fuel crunch faced by the country.

The government is constrained by the fact that they don’t have too many explored blocks on offer and the power sector needs large blocks. It cannot do with small blocks. Given the background, they might be coming up with the auction of six-seven blocks.

The Coal Ministry has also approached the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) seeking a feedback from it on the seven blocks.

The Coal Ministry started debating so as to whether they can have some environmental comfort and therefore took up these seven blocks with the Ministry of Environment; they have said that as long as the Environment Ministry can  assure that these blocks don’t fall in inviolate areas that will be a sufficient push.

Srivastava also said that exploration is the biggest constraint with regard to the auction of the mines. But still have not been able to really tackle the issue as to how to auction a regionally explored block.

Source: Economic Times

Goods and Services Tax Holds Key to Growth

The Goods and Services Tax (GST) is a reforms initiative that seeks to replace all indirect taxes levied on goods and services by the Centre and States and make it comprehensive for most goods and services. Some of the States have been resisting it on the ground that it would infringe on their financial autonomy.

CII feels that introduction of the contentious GST is a high priority area for the country to improve its economic growth and gross domestic product (GDP). It will also exert pressure on the States opposing it to agree to its implementation.

With the CII concluding that accelerated economic growth is vital in the present circumstances, CII’s new President, S Gopalakrishnan, stressed that reforms like implementation of the GST was a must.

“It is a high priority area. If GST comes into force, it will add at least 1.2 per cent to the GDP. We have met several chief ministers and we are hopeful to convince them”, he said.

The CII president said with moderation of inflation rates, check on fiscal deficit and positive outlook on current account deficit suggest that a growth percentage of around 6.2 per cent was achievable in 2013-14.